Families in northern Gaza ‘forced to survive on a less than a can of beans a day’

‘Israel is making deliberate choices to starve civilians’ says Oxfam amid concerns of further hunger in the aftermath of Israel’s fatal bombing of food charity WCK convoy

Palestinian toddler Leila Jeneid, who is suffering from severe malnutrition, receives treatment at Kamal Adwan Hospital as the conflict between Israel and Hamas continues (Reuters)

Families in northern Gaza are being forced to live on less than a can of fava beans a day, Oxfam has said, as senior UN officials described malnourished newborns so small that they weigh little more than a kilo.

More than 300,000 people are still believed to be trapped in the north of the besieged strip, which has seen the worst of Israel’s ferocious bombardment and where little to no aid has been getting in.

There, since January, families have been surviving on an average of 245 calories a day, according to Oxfam – less than 12 per cent of the average recommended daily calorie intake.

“Israel is making deliberate choices to starve civilians,” said Amitabh Behar, Oxfam’s international executive director.

“Imagine what it is like, not only to be trying to survive on 245 calories – day in, day out – but also having to watch your children or elderly relatives do the same.”

It comes as some aid agencies have said they will have to pull back from Gaza over concerns for the safety of their staff after Israeli forces admitted killing seven employees of food charity World Central Kitchen (WCK) in a drone attack despite the fact that the aid workers were travelling in a deconflicted area. Israel has since promised to open three new aid corridors.

WCK has served over 30 million meals inside Gaza, and its work has formed a major part of the response to the looming famine. The charity has had to suspend its operations over safety concerns in the wake of the fatal bombing.

Jamie McGoldrick, the UN coordinator for aid in the occupied Palestinian territory, says that a third of all children under the age of two in Gaza are malnourished (Reuters)

Jamie McGoldrick, the UN coordinator for aid in the occupied Palestinian territory, who visited Gaza recently, said the pullback by aid agencies in response to the killing of the seven WCK aid workers – along with more than 220 others since October – had come at the “worst time” given the hunger crisis.

He said that right now a third of all children in Gaza under the age of two are malnourished.

“Food assistance to combat famine is desperately needed everywhere. It is a time of great hardship and suffering,” he told The Independent after returning from a visit to Kamal Adwan Hospital, one of the only facilities in the war-ravaged north that is still treating newborns and children.

There he described visiting neonatal wards where there were multiple babies in a single incubator. He said he had seen skeletal toddlers, and newborn babies, “drowning” in their nappies, who weighed little more than a bag of sugar.

“Every single child was in a terrible condition – the dehydration, the emaciation was unimaginable. Some of the children were so skinny you could see their ribcages,” he said.

“There was a newborn who weighed just 1.2kg and was tiny inside his [nappy]. I saw his small spindly legs coming out of the bottom. His hand was no bigger than my thumb.”

Israel launched its heaviest bombardment yet of Gaza, along with a crippling siege, in retaliation for the 7 October massacre by Hamas on southern Israel, where militants killed at least 1,200 people and took another 240, including children, hostage.

Palestinian health officials in the Hamas-run territory say that Israel’s bombing has killed more than 33,000 Palestinians, the vast majority of them women and children.

Now aid agencies fear that starvation will be the next major killer to stalk the besieged strip. Over a million people are suffering an extreme level of hunger, according to a UN-backed report.

Some aid agencies have said they will have to pull back from Gaza over concerns for their workers’ safety after Israeli forces admitted killing seven employees of food charity World Central Kitchen in a drone attack (Reuters)

Israel has been accused by multiple UN agencies and aid groups of being responsible for a “man-made famine” because of its restrictions on aid going into and through Gaza – including aid being stopped at the southern entry point from Egypt, and convoys going to the north being barred or turned back.

Israel has vehemently denied the presence of famine in Gaza as well as accusations that it is using hunger as a weapon of war. Cogat, the defence ministry body charged with coordinating with the Palestinians, has repeatedly told The Independent that there are no limits on aid deliveries to Gaza.

But under searing pressure from the international community, in particular its closest ally the US, the Israeli government announced on Friday that it would finally reopen its first land crossing into northern Gaza and temporarily allow supplies for the territory to come in via the port of Ashdod in southern Israel.

It did not say when the Erez crossing would open – and many fear, in the wake of the killing of the WCK workers, that there are still not sufficient security guarantees to allow safe passage of the aid even if it does get in.

This strangulation of food and medical supplies has meant, according to Oxfam’s analysis, that families in northern Gaza have been subsisting on a few hundred calories a day since January. There, children are already dying from starvation and malnutrition, worsened by disease.

Israel is making deliberate choices to starve civilians

Amitabh Behar, international executive director, Oxfam

Oxfam said that hunger and its effects are exacerbated by the near complete destruction of civilian infrastructure – including hospitals, water and sanitation services, and community health support – which has left people even more vulnerable to disease.

Gaza’s agriculture industry has also been destroyed – and so the small amounts of fruit and vegetables that are available are prohibitively costly. Specialist nutrition products and centres to treat malnourished children are also difficult or impossible to find.

Mr McGoldrick said that access for aid is still limited, and that aid agencies need the sort of “security and protection that clearly does not exist”.